Profile

I’m from London and have lived here my whole life except for a few years in Oxford for uni, and a year working as a doctor in Zanzibar. I’m really into sport; particularly football and American football. I support Brentford and the Green Bay Packers. I like running, and playing football when I can (5 a side with other scientists from the Institute of Cancer Research, where I work). Very randomly, my other hobby is crochet. 😬 I like making blankets for friends who have had kids. I find it really relaxing and good for mindfulness. Favourite TV shows are Game of Thrones (obvs), and South Park.

I work on a particular type of breast cancer called triple-negative breast cancer, which is the most difficult type to cure and for which new treatments are really needed. Radiotherapy is a treatment which has been used for about 100 years, for almost all types of cancer, and works by killing cancer cells. Some people (including me!) now think that radiotherapy can also work in a different way, by activating the body’s immune system. My research is exploring whether we can use this immune system effect of radiotherapy to treat triple-negative breast cancer. I am doing this by investigating new immune system treatments including viruses, and combining them with radiotherapy.

I have developed a new strain of cells in the lab to investigate this. The cells grow as structures called organoids, and they behave more like cells in the body than other types of cells grown in a dish. As you can see in this video, as the cells grow they first move towards each other and form structures (called organoids), then the organoids start moving and joining together.

Because the immune system is so complicated, you can’t fully investigate it in a dish. When we discover a new treatment combination that we think will help people, before we use it on humans we have to test it’s effect in mice to make sure that it’s safe and that it works. From this work we can look at lots of different cells in the mouse immune system. This picture shows results from a method called flow cytometry, and shows us a range of different cell types.

I first have to check my e mails and media channels because I collaborate with a lot of different scientists, and I need to know if there have been any new developments. I often have meetings with other scientists in the mornings. This is usually to plan experiments or to look at each other’s results. I then have to look at all of my cells under the microscope to check that they are healthy and if I need to do any work on them. Then I prepare the chemicals that I need to use for my experiments. Then I’ll spend a few hours doing an experiment in a special very clean cabinet called a tissue culture hood. After that I’ll analyse my data, and maybe have a meeting or two. If I am working with mice then I’ll start the day by checking that they are healthy and if they need anything (like extra food). Then later in the day I’ll give any treatments that they might need, like medicines or radiotherapy.